The world’s largest money-printing giant went bankrupt: Once printed 1/3 of global cash for 140 countries, it is now shaken because of electronic payments.

Glorious period of centuries

De La Rue is the world’s largest money printing company with 198 years of age and is based in Basingstoke, England. In addition to printing money, De La Rue also contracts contracts to print passport, passport, and tax stamps for central banks of countries. The company’s three largest factories are currently located at Team Valley in Gateshead, Debden in Essex and Bathford in Somerest.

To date, De La Rue is the world’s largest commercial printing company, printing about one-third of global cash through contracts with 140 central banks in the world. De La Rue is also the business that designs 36% of the paper notes in circulation.

In the past, De La Rue had a glorious period lasting for centuries. The company was founded in 1860 by Thomas de la Rue – a printer on the small island of Guemsey in the English-French Strait.

The company initially printed bank notes for Mauritius, then printed money for England. In 1921, the De La Rue family began selling shares to investors. Banknote printing hardly met a significant competitor. In 1947, De La Rue was officially listed on the London Stock Exchange.

After that, the company increased its investment in Italy and Switzerland and acquired lucrative money printing contracts from the central banks of these two countries. In the Middle East, since 1960, the company has been printing money to the Central Bank of Iran.

De La Rue’s competitors at the time were Portal Limited, a company nearly 300 years old and printing banknotes for the Bank of England since 1724. Both merged in the hit deal in 1995 and De La Rue. officially holds more than 30% of global foil supply.

Two years later, on a favorable course of business, the company acquired Harrison and Sons – a company specializing in printing stamps and bank notes in England. But the deal brought in millions of dollars in losses and the factory was permanently closed in 2003.

When the Olympics come down …

Since then, the company’s business has fluctuated. Despite continuing to receive banknotes for central banks of the countries, the recession has been prolonged, along with an increase in the use of electronic payments and a change in monetary policy. , the civil status policy, has moved De La Rue.

In 2018, the company encountered a major obstacle when the British government decided to stop the contract and switch to passport printing at a factory in France. The loss of this $ 525 million contract hit De La Rue’s financial balance strongly, so in October 2019, the company had to sell Identity Solutions to HID Global for more than $ 50 million to balance. for the cost.

Difficulties piled up, De La Rue’s share price was only 130 pounds in the latest session, compared to the peak in October 2019 of £ 226 / share. De La Rue’s market capitalization is only $ 158 million.

“It is undeniable that the financial situation of De La Rue seems to be very precarious,” said Mr. Russ Mold, investment director of AJ Bell.

About 2,500 employees of De La Rue could be at risk if the company could not avoid bankruptcy.